CPM leader’s house attacked

A STAFF REPORTER

A CPM councillor in north Calcutta has alleged that Trinamul workers attacked his house late on Thursday, a day after minister Jyotipriya Mullick told party workers in Birati to treat CPM supporters like “cobra”.

Trinamul leaders, however, denied the allegation.

This was the second instance in a month of Trinamul workers being accused of attacking elected representatives from the CPM. On January 6, Trinamul leader Arabul Islam had allegedly led an attack on CPM MLA Abdur Rezzak Mollah in Bhangar.

Around 1.30am on Thursday, Rajib Biswas, the councillor of ward 33, was woken up by a loud sound from the roof of his home on Khoda Gunje Road, off Beleghata Main Road. “I peeped out of the window and saw 15-20 youths throwing bricks at my house and abusing me. They were also armed with iron rods,” Biswas, chairman of borough 3, recalled on Friday.

Biswas lives in the house with his wife and two children, his brother’s family and his aged parents. “Baba wanted to go out but we begged him not to,” said the councillor’s 17-year-old daughter, Rupsha.

Biswas said the attackers had threatened him to call off a meeting he had called in the locality on February 2 to mobilise support for the CPM’s rally at Esplanade on February 10. “They were saying during the 45-minute attack that they would not allow us to organise any meeting in the area,” said Biswas.

In his complaint lodged with Beleghata police station, Biswas had blamed the attack on provocative speeches by some Trinamul leaders. He did not name any leader though.

At the Wednesday rally in Birati, North 24-Parganas, minister Mullick had said: “What will you do if a keute or gokhra (cobra) enters your house? You all know what to do with such poisonous snakes. Treat the CPM like a snake,” Mullick had said.

The CPM had lost the Beleghata Assembly seat in the 2011 polls but the area still remains a stronghold of the party.

Local Trinamul leaders attributed the midnight attack to feuds within the CPM.

“He is blaming the Trinamul Congress for the attack but has not identified anybody. The so-called attack last night was the result of a feud between two lobbies in the CPM,” said Pabitra Biswas, former Trinamul councillor.